The grand Manhattan apartment, which fashion designer Herbert Kasper has called home for more than four decades and which is filled with an extensive collection of museum-quality artwork and furniture, is for sale from his property.
Kasper, as he was called, died in March 2020 at the age of 93 after a long career in the fashion industry. Kasper brand, now part of Premier Brands Group Holdings, makes affordable sportswear and apparel for women.
Recognition…Getty
The sprawling cooperative residence on the sixth floor at 32 East 64th Street, a.k.a. in Verona, is priced at $ 10 million with monthly maintenance of $ 14,267, according to Sotheby & # 39; s International Realty's stockbroker Meredyth Hull Smith.
Kasper bought the Upper East Side apartment in 1979 from the combined estate of Mary Cushing Fosburgh, a celebrity and philanthropist, and her husband, James Whitney Fosburgh, a painter and art collector, for about $ 400,000. He largely kept the pre-war layout, but renovated the kitchen and bathrooms and restored many of the original architectural features, including the moldings and fireplace surrounds.
"He restored the bones," said David E. Stutzman, an estate planning attorney and one of the executors of Kasper's estate, along with Michael Findlay, an art dealer and close friend of Kasper's.
The unit has approximately 4,700 square feet, with 10-foot ceilings, multiple oversized windows, and hardwood floors. There are three master bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, as well as a staff bedroom and bathroom, a small staff office and a guest toilet.
"The space is so big that it can easily be converted into a four or five bedroom apartment," said Ms. Smith.
The house is accessed via a private elevator vestibule with an inlaid marble floor, which leads to a central gallery. Off the gallery, on the north side of the apartment, is a library / cave known as the Brown Room, which is anchored by a wood-burning fireplace and which contains a huge Helen Frankenthaler painting as well as numerous old master drawings.
Mr Findlay said Kasper often greeted his guests in this room before going into the living room. "He loved sitting in the brown room," added Mr. Stutzman. "He felt comfortable surrounded by all these works of art."
A west-facing salon with classic columns and two Picasso drawings sits between the living room, also with a fireplace, and the formal dining room, which features a Léger painting over another fireplace and an ornate Coromandel Chinese screen. The rooms are lined up in an enfilade style.
The windowed eat-in kitchen nearby has an industrial-style stainless steel oven and a large pantry with a wine fridge.
At the end of an art-lined hallway next to the gallery is a guest toilet and guest room. A longer corridor with more artwork leads to the other bedrooms at the south end of the apartment. The primary suite has a large bathroom, gas fireplace, and spacious walk-in closet.
The apartment was decorated by Belgian interior designer Axel Vervoordt, who mixed an assortment of modern furniture and his own sofas and coffee tables with antique pieces – although they all seem to play a supporting role in the multitude of drawings, photographs, sculptures and other works by Picasso , Léger, Matisse and Mapplethorpe, to name a few that can be found throughout the room. Some of these works were shown 10 years ago in a major exhibition at the Morgan Library and Museum entitled "Manierism & Modernism".
Executives say many pieces will be auctioned by Christie sometime this fall, while others will be donated to museums, including the Morgan Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Most of the proceeds from the sale of the apartment, artwork and furnishings will go to various charities including those providing education in the fine arts, assistance to the homeless, and medical treatment and research.
The Verona, a 10-storey apartment building in the Italian Renaissance style with 20 residential units, was built in 1908. It is located on the corner of 64th Street and Madison Avenue, one block from Central Park. Among the most recent deals, Jeffrey Zucker, the president of CNN who previously ran NBCUniversal, and his wife Caryn Zucker completed the sale of their five-bedroom third-floor unit for $ 15.4 million last month.
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